Relatively small quantities of cable assemblies are typically manufactured by means of hand operated bench mounted machines. This is especially the case where the cable assembly is composed of a planar, multi-conductor cable terminated to insulation displacement contacts, insulation piercing contacts, or similar contacts housed in modular plug type connectors. Such cable assemblies are in widespread use in the communications and computer industries and are beginning to find applications in other industries as well. These bench machines have a terminating station which receives the end of a cable to be terminated and a connector already placed in position on the end of the cable, the outer jacket of the cable having been previously removed. Some of these machines include the capability to perform electrical tests of the terminations by means of test probes which make electrical contact with the connector contacts terminated to the two ends of the cable. When manually inserting a connector and associated cable into the terminating station these test probes are engaged by the connector contacts and must be pushed back by compressing their springs until the connector is fully seated within the terminating station. The connector is then held there in position against the force of the probe springs while the machine is actuated to effect the termination. However, there is no assurance that the connector remains fully seated within the terminating station until actual termination takes place. This is because, if the operator were to relax the forward pressure urging the connector toward the terminating station, the force of the probe springs would cause the connector to back away from the terminating station prior to actuation of the machine, resulting in a defective termination, damaged connector, or damaged tooling.
What is needed is a mechanism for positively holding the connector in its fully seated position within the terminating station against the countering force of the probes until termination is effected, the terminated connector then being easily and quickly releasable from the machine.